Shopping
by Adrian Tullberg
Summary: Looking for that perfect thing ...?


Shopping

By Adrian Tullberg

* * *

Not too long after _The Doctor's Wife_

* * *

The redhead peered around in the open area in the still hours of the night. "This doesn't look like a shopping centre to me."

"Well observed Pond."

"Might I add that this looks a lot like a graveyard? And dare I pursue this train of thought to suggest that this is, in fact, the graveyard that this looks like?"

Rory switched on the torch, and scanned the area. "It's a very nice graveyard."

"So it should be. We're in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery. You don't get less downmarket then here in this timezone ... this way."

As the lanky figure loped down the pathway, Amy looked at the well manicured lawn. "You like those little ... plaque things?"

"Hmm."

"You can have a plaque. Me, I want a whopping big tombstone. '_Here lies Amy Pond, dead of heart failure after entertaining three male supermodels for thirty-six hours straight'_."

"Thanks."

"Rory, I'm not going to be leaving you."

"Even for three male supermodels?"

"Someone has to hold the videocamera."

The Doctor appeared in front of them, gesturing wildly. "Over here!"

The two jogged over to the Doctor. "Doctor, I have to agree with Amy that this wasn't what I thought we'd be going when you said we were going shopping."

"Best bargains are in the most unlikely places. I think I can recreate Idris."

Rory gave Amy a glance. "But ... okay, you said that you couldn't put ... her back in a human body ... eleventh dimensional ... spacey-wacey ... you have got to think of a phrase that's more dignified than that ..."

The trio headed to a large enclosed area; what looked like the crypts, a sign overhead stating _Corridor of Memories_. "Yes, the Matrix can't be removed. However ... the onboard translation systems have a significantly powerful range, and to be honest, a lot of ... it's bandwidth isn't fully utilised. Now, it may be a job and a half to keep a humanoid body function for any length of time with an eleventh-dimensional consciousness inside it, but ... say I modified the core TARDIS systems to continuously transmit and receive into an appropriately altered organic vessel ..."

Rory continued the train of logic. "... the TARDIS would be safe inside ... the TARDIS, but remote controlling a body ...?"

"Hah!" Amy looked pleased. "I knew it! So that was the reason you took us to the premiere of _Avatar_, wasn't it?"

Rory saw an expression of shock flicker across the Doctor's face, replaced with an unconvincing '_you-got-me-aren't-you-clever'_ expression. "What can I say?"

Of course, Amy completely missed this due to her basking in her imagined victory.

Having entered the crypts, the Doctor was looking at the plinths. "Of course that means we have to find a proper body ..."

"Now, when you mean a body..."

The Doctor stopped, looking very pleased with himself. "And for the old girl ... why not get the best?"

Amy trained her torch on the metal plinth. She physically felt the shock through her body.

Rory, bless him, didn't deal so well with unexpected situations and shocks. If he'd had a grasp of the situation, then he'd do very well, but somehow the Doctor managed to find new ways of turning one of the most capable nurses in Leadworth into a near-stuttering wreck.

"W ... we ... we're robbing the grave of _Marilyn Monroe_?"

"That colour your face is turning, not good for you."

"Do not distract me from the graverobbing."

"Look, it's not robbing, in the strictest possible sense. It's ... someone has left a perfectly good sofa on the pavement and you've got an empty place in your lounge that it'll fill perfectly." The Doctor produced his screwdriver and started sonic-ing the marble. "Besides, I was married to her."

"Oh, so now the chapel counts?"

Rory was either trying to make sense of the situation or trying to get out of a crime that would leave him unemployable. "But ... right now, Marilyn Monroe has been filled full of all sorts of chemicals! Stuffed with ... all sorts of objects!"

"Yeah, and then the undertakers had a go."

The Doctor was carefully lowering the marble front to the floor. "Amy, shush. There's some medical equipment in the TARDIS that can repair poor Norma's body to the point where we can get stuck into the modifications properly."

"We ..."

"Well, I have Leadworth's best nurse to give me a hand with that, don't I?"

Amy leaned towards Rory as the Doctor reached into the crypt. "You know, when people ask me _'Being a kissergram while waiting for a modelling job really isn't much of a job, why don't you do what Rory does?_' , I wish I could say _'Because nobody ever makes a kissergram do crap like this'_."

Rory didn't respond; he was too busy watching the Doctor stroke the revealed casket ... well, like he stroked the TARDIS console.

"That looks very heavy, I don't think ..."

With a flourish, the Doctor produced a folded up square of flat metal and pipes. "24th Century battlefield stretcher. Localised gravity field holds the body on top, antigrav makes it as light as a feather. Literally; don't let go if there's a strong breeze. Just give me a hand with this, did you know they called this the Cadillac of Caskets..?"

Maybe Amy could get him a job wearing a gorilla costume.

* * *

Rory had to admit, he had textbooks heavier than this. Maybe he could borrow this next time he had to move furniture.

"Still managed to involve me in this crap ..."

Of course, Amy would still complain, purely to maintain tradition.

"Oh, she's going to love this. Mobility. Endocrine system. Tongue twisters. Eating sweets until you're sick the next day after ..."

As the three and their cargo approached the TARDIS, the Doctor produced his key and attempted to open the door.

Attempted, as the Doctor struggled with the key in the lock. You are never more aware of how long it takes to open a door when you and your wife are holding the body of one of the 20th Century's most famous icons.

The Doctor gave up using the lock, and began bashing the door. "Come on, open up!"

"Doctor, the actual graverobbing was quieter than this ..."

"I got her for you! Come on! It's quality!" The Doctor appeared to be listening to something that he didn't like the sound of. "Is it because she's blonde? I can fix that! It's ... but ..."

With the slumped shoulders of someone who has decisively lost the argument, the Doctor took the handles of the stretcher from Amy. "We're taking her back."

Rory had never been so happy to know he had to put a heavy object he'd just moved back in it's original location, and never would be again.

Amy watched the two walk back towards the crypt, then gave the door a comradely pat. "And that's why we go along and pick what they're buying us, right?"

The click of the door unlocking gave her the second sense of being right of the night.


End file.
